6 MBBS candidates submit fake NRI certs; cancelled now

6 MBBS candidates submit fake NRI certs; cancelled now

Pushpa.Narayan@timesofindia.com  23/11/2024

Chennai : Six MBBS-aspirants under Non-Resident Indian (NRI) quota category had forged the embassy certificates, and three of them managed to get seats allotted in self-financing colleges, said the state selection committee which handles medical admissions. The MBBS seats allotted to the three candidates have been cancelled, and now these will be included in the seat matrix during the special stray vacancy round scheduled for next week, the committee announced on Friday. It said the candidature of all six candidates was cancelled after ‘genuinity verification’. The committee sought verification of documents submitted by candidates to the respective embassies/consulates. At least four of them – Canada, Dubai, Riyadh, and Jeddah – replied stating that the certificates of six candidates were fake. Officials from the embassies also sought an action taken report from the govt. 

“We will be initiating legal action against the candidates. Their applications have been decl ared invalid,” a senior official said. Replies from a few other embassies/consulates are still awaited. Up to 15% of the seats in self-financing medical colleges and private medical universities are set aside for the NRI quota. These seats are reserved for students with NRI/OCI/PIO status. 

To apply under this category, students must provide documents that show their parents or relatives (one of the eight categories, such as sibling, grandparent, uncle, or aunt) are living abroad. “While processing applications before the first round of MBBS admission, more than 100 applications were made ineligible. This was because the ‘relatives’ were not as per the specification, or documents were insufficient,” the official said. The committee later emailed documents, including embassy certificates, to the respective embassies for verification. “We started the counselling because we have limited time. Three out of the six candidates were granted seats in two medical colleges,” he said. 

Two candidates were accepted into Madha Medical College and Research Institute in Chennai, while one was placed  in Karpagam Faculty of Medical Sciences and Research in Coimbatore. All these allotments have now been cancelled. These three seats will be added to the seat matrix for the special round of counselling, scheduled to begin on Nov 25. This will take the total seat tally for the special stray round to 60 – one seat in Stanley Medical College, six seats NRI/NRI lapsed seats in self-financing colleges, three NRI admissions that were cancelled, and 50 additional seats to Annaii Medical College and Hospital.